Pages

30 November 2012

I recently learned from Guy Goodwin-Gill that the 2013 Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition is focusing on a hypothetical case involving, among other things, climate change-related migration, an island state that disappears, boat people, immigrant detention, and the proposed transfer of detainees to a third state. For those of you who are not familiar with the Jessup competition, it is a "simulation of a fictional dispute between countries before the International Court of Justice, the judicial organ of the United Nations. One team is allowed to participate from every eligible school. Teams prepare oral and written pleadings arguing both the applicant and respondent positions of the case." It's organized by the International Law Students Association (ILSA).

The problem in this hypothetical case is presented in the form of a "compromis," which is defined as "a formal agreement between nations submitting a dispute to arbitration and defining the terms of the submission... ." The 2013 Jessup compromis is officially titled "Compromis
between Alfurna (Applicant)
and the State of Rutasia (Respondent)
to Submit to the International Court of Justice
the Differences between the Parties
concerning the Alfurnan Migrants"; the text is available here, where visitors will also find corrections to/clarifications of the text as well as additional competition materials (i.e., relevant legal instruments).

Moreover, this ILSA-IBA web cast features Guy Goodwin-Gill and Michael Waibel discussing the issues raised in the compromis with Joe Terrenzio, ILSA’s Jessup Competition Coordinator, and providing helpful suggestions for additional reading and resources that might assist teams in the preparation of their arguments.

The compromis certainly highlights a number of forced migration topics which are currently the subject of extensive debate and its "sinking island" scenario may not remain hypothetical for much longer. It is no secret that many island states today are actively exploring different avenues for protecting themselves in the face of rising sea levels. So it will be interesting to see what the participating teams come up with next spring! In the meantime, I hope the information provided on this blog can be useful to everyone with their research!

29 November 2012

Podcast: Stephen Yale-Loehr and Stanley Mailman on 125 Years of Matthew Bender (LexisNexis, Nov. 2012) [access]
- Discussion with editors of the 21-volume Immigration Law and Procedure.

"Protecting the Protectors or Victimizing the Victims Anew? 'Material Support of Terrorism' and Exclusion from Refugee Status in U.S. and European Courts," ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law, vol. 18, no. 2 (2012) [text via SSRN]

Return and Reintegration of Internally Displaced Persons in Post-Conflict Situations: Right Based Approach to Peacebuilding (SSRN, Nov. 2012) [text]

The Role of 'Credibility' in International Protection Claims, Dublin, 9 Nov. 2012 [info]
- Videos of speeches and other materials are available here.

On 12-13 December 2012 in Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees will hold a Dialogue on Protection Challenges that focuses on "Faith and Protection." The aim is to "highlight the important role that local religious communities play in protecting asylum-seekers, refugees and other persons of concern to UNHCR and the core values shared with the broader humanitarian community" and "explore how humanitarian actors can better engage with religious communities to improve the protection of forcibly displaced and stateless people."

For more information on topics that will be addressed, check the schedule, and read the background document and the concept note. In addition, the web page for the meeting provides access to a series of documents that shed light on the perspective of various religious traditions towards refugee assistance and protection.

Report of the Sixty-third Session of the Executive
Committee of the High Commissioner’s
Programme, UN Doc. No. A/AC/96/1119 (UN General Assembly, Oct. 2012) [text]

Report of the United Nations
High Commissioner for
Refugees: Covering the Period 1 January 2011-30 June
2012, UN Doc. No. A/67/12 (UN General Assembly, 2012) [text]
- See also related HC speech and ICRC statement.

UNHCR Position on Returns to North Kivu, South Kivu and Adjacent Areas in the Democratic Republic of Congo Affected by On-going Conflict and Violence in the Region (UNHCR, Nov. 2012) [text]
- See also related press release.

The Encyclopedia of Global Human Migration is currently accessible online on a subscription basis, and will be published in print as a five-volume set in February 2013. Various articles have been made freely available as sample content; happily, several of them focus on forced migration issues, including:

News:Refuge recently underwent two changes: First, it is now Canada's Journal on Refugees, rather than "Periodical." And second, it is now officially Open Access. In the past, articles had been made available online in full at no cost, in tandem with the release of the print version. The latter has now been dispensed with, and Refuge is online only.

Geopolitics, vol. 17, no. 2 (2012) [contents]
- Special issue on "The Geopolitics of Migration and Mobility"; includes "The Geopolitics of Migrant Mobility: Tracing State Relations through Refugee Claims, Boats, and Discourses" and several articles on detention and deportation.

Immigrants & Minorities, vol. 30, nos. 2-3 (2012) [contents]
- Special issue on "Refugees in Britain: Cultural and Political Transfer since c.1830"; the preface and introduction are freely available in full-text.

Gay Rights and the UN: One Step Back, One Step Forward (The Asylumist, Nov. 2012) [text]

Guidelines on International Protection no. 9: Claims to Refugee Status based on Sexual Orientation and/or Gender Identity within the context of Article 1A(2) of the 1951 Convention and/or its 1967 Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees (UNHCR, Oct. 2012) [text]
- See also related Human Rights First blog post.

"Is Switzerland an EU Member State? Asylum Law Harmonization through the Backdoor," Chapter in The Global Reach of European Refugee Law (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming 2013) [preprint via SSRN]

Exploring Everyday Practice and Resistance in Immigration Detention, Feb. 2013-Oct. 2014, UK [info]
- "Through five one-day workshop events, the seminar series will span the academic disciplines of criminology, geography, politics and sociology in order to examine the phenomenon of detention as it relates to supporting detainees, penology and prisons, everyday experiences of detention and the politics of, and resistance to, detention practices."

Research Symposium: Health in Humanitarian Settings, Liverpool, 3 December 2012 [info]
- Programme is not yet available, but registration is open.

Looking for Graduate School Applicants for Research in Forced Migration, Trauma and Stress at Fordham University [info]
- Deadline for the 2013 cohort is 5 December 2012.

Inquiry into Asylum Support for Children and Young People, London [info]
- Deadline for submission of written evidence to The Children's Society is 7 December 2012.

Call for Papers: Special Issue on Forced Migration/Convocatoria Edición Especial de Migración Forzada [info]
- Submit articles for special issue of the Colombian Law Review on International Law by 10 December 2012.

High Commissioner's Dialogue on Protection Challenges, Geneva, 12-13 December 2012 [info]
- The theme is "Faith and Protection."

"Resilience and Its Association with Depression, Emotional and Behavioural Problems, and Mental Health Service Utilisation among Refugee Adolescents Living in South Australia," International Journal of Population Research, vol. 2012, article ID 485956 (March 2012) [open access text]

The UNHCR web site has added a new page that focuses on Labour Mobility for Refugees. The page provides access to materials and presentations from the recently-held conference of the same name, as well as links to a number of related discussion papers and laws/policies.

Other resources include:

The Enforcement of Refugees’ Employment Rights in Africa and the Regional Human Rights Framework (Refugee Work Rights, Oct. 2012) [text]

The Impact of Precarious Legal Status on Immigrants’ Economic Outcomes, IRPP Study, no. 35 (Institute for Research on Public Policy, Oct. 2012) [text]
- Note: The authors of this study will present their findings at a workshop on 29 Nov. 2012 in Toronto.

15 November 2012

More on the subject of innovation, with a focus on Information and Communication Technologies...

Another Tool in the Toolbox, Report on the Aid & International Development Forum, Washington, DC, 6-7 June 2012 [text]

ICT Humanitarian Emergency Platform [access]
- "[D]eveloped to support IT and telecommunications specialists operating in humanitarian emergencies. This platform is a unique communication and collaboration tool that can help the entire humanitarian community in exchanging knowledge and creating a live network of expertise."

Interoperability of Mobile Devices for Crisis Management: Outcomes of the 1st JRC ECML Crisis Technology Workshop on Mobile Interoperability for International Field Deployment, Ispra, Italy, 12-13 March 2012 (European Commission, May 2012) [access]
- Follow link for final report and workshop documents.

"New Information Technologies and their Impact on the Humanitarian Sector," International Review of the Red Cross, no. 884 (2011) [full-text]

Uniting through Technology: A Case Study of the Collaboration between Ericsson, Refugees United and UNHCR for Uniting Refugees (KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sept. 2012) [text]

What Percentage of Tweets Generated during a Crisis are Relevant for Humanitarian Response? (iRevolution, Nov. 2012) [text]
- Includes link to related earlier post describing new project to develop a Twitter Dashboard for the Humanitarian Cluster System.

The Refugee Studies Centre's Humanitarian Innovation Project (HIP) was officially launched today. Its aim is to "improve the innovation process within the humanitarian world" by developing "a methodology for bottom-up humanitarian innovation, which can be applied at the field level." More information about the project can be found on its newly created web site. Visitors can also explore the HIP Database, which records information about a wide variety of humanitarian solutions in such a way as to better assess their potential for innovation.

Other sections of the web site provide access to news about the project and other humanitarian innovations, the project's blog, and its resources. The latter category includes videos/podcasts, background reading, and the latest publications from the HIP team, specifically:

14 November 2012

With Swaziland as the 15th ratification, the African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (Kampala Convention) will officially enter into force on 6 December 2012!

(Update: See the comments section for a note contributed by Alessandro Fiorini at Asilo in Europa regarding new instructions from the Italian Ministry of the Interior for dealing with North African migrants.)

Publications:

Common European Asylum System: An Answer to Asylum Burdens in the EU? (International Studies Society – Belgrade, Oct. 2012) [text]

Judicial Implementation of Article 3 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in Europe: The Case of Migrant Children Including Unaccompanied Children (Unicef & OHCHR, June 2012) [text]

The Key Tenets and Implications of the Proposed Amendments to the Dublin Regulation and the Reception Conditions Directive, Interview with Cecilia Wikström, Member of the European Parliament and
Rapporteur on the Recast of the Dublin Regulation (Eurasylum, Nov. 2012) [text]

MA in Humanitarian Assistance (Tufts University) [info]
- A "one-year joint degree offered by the Friedman School and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. The program is geared toward mid-career professionals who have significant field experience in humanitarian assistance." Apply by 28 Feb. 2013.